"The Last Gunfight - The Real Story of the Shootout at the O.K. Corral, and How It Changed the American West" By Jeff Guinn, 392 pps., published by Simon & Schuster

Let’s start with the title. It wasn’t the last gunfight in the Old West, and it didn’t take place at the O.K. Corral, and it didn’t change anything, but it probably is the real story of this infamous and deadly 30 seconds, or at least as close as anyone’s ever going to get to it. The shootout between the Earps and Doc Holliday on one side, and Ike and Billy Clanton, the McLowry brothers, and Billy Claiborne on the other, was one of the very rare face-to-face instances of gunslinging in a time and place where backshooting was the norm, and, along with the unpleasantness at the Little Big Horn is probably the single most famous episode of the Wild, Wild West.

Mr. Guinn’s great strength is not as a writer (He’s OK, but no better), but as a historian. He has dug up information that no one else has, and what emerges is a picture of the times and people that is unlike anything you’re going to see on a movie screen.

A few examples: Wyatt was what people then called a ne’er do-well. He aspired to a chief lawman’s job, money, and the respect of the community and never got any of them. He spent the entirety of his long life in and out of poverty. On the way to the O.K. Corral, he carried his Colt Peacemaker (not a Buntline Special) not in a holster, but in a special canvas-lined pocket.

Book Review: "The Last Gunfight"

“The Last Gunfight – The Real Story of the Shootout at the O.K. Corral, and How It Changed the American West” By Jeff Guinn, 392 pps., published by Simon & Schuster

Let’s start with the title. It wasn’t the last gunfight in the Old West, and it didn’t take place at the O.K. Corral, and it didn’t change anything, but it probably is the real story of this infamous and deadly 30 seconds, or at least as close as anyone’s ever going to get to it. The shootout between the Earps and Doc Holliday on one side, and Ike and Billy Clanton, the McLowry brothers, and Billy Claiborne on the other, was one of the very rare face-to-face instances of gunslinging in a time and place where backshooting was the norm, and, along with the unpleasantness at the Little Big Horn is probably the single most famous episode of the Wild, Wild West.

Mr. Guinn’s great strength is not as a writer (He’s OK, but no better), but as a historian. He has dug up information that no one else has, and what emerges is a picture of the times and people that is unlike anything you’re going to see on a movie screen.

A few examples: Wyatt was what people then called a ne’er do-well. He aspired to a chief lawman’s job, money, and the respect of the community and never got any of them. He spent the entirety of his long life in and out of poverty. On the way to the O.K. Corral, he carried his Colt Peacemaker (not a Buntline Special) not in a holster, but in a special canvas-lined pocket.